Abstract

Since 1979, Margaret Thatcher's Government has changed the direction of housing policy in line with its general market philosophy. As a result, the housing market is now, in important ways, operating more efficiently. But the Government did not always follow its own market logic. For example, blinded by its obsession with home‐ownership, it ended up retaining parts of a subsidy system which help those who, in the Government's own terms, should need it least.